[LRflex] Dr. Kaufmann's speech

Herewith is a Google computer translation of Dr. Kaufmann's speech re the S2. (Douglas please excuse the crudity of this.) Better translations are obviously welcome. 

All the best,

Bill

Contents Leica, which are friends
By Editorial photo scala
Created 24/09/2008 - 16:45
Recording
The S2 is there, the R10 comes Leica Wetzlar goes - and has a long breath. Stich points from a speech by Leica CEO Dr. Andreas Kaufmann on the occasion of the S2 idea - code-named "Africa":
Here is the speech by Dr. Andreas Kaufmann, the script was taken from the almost literally has been kept so well; reduced to a short conclusion, which is about to Organizational evening to photokina and went: 

Cologne, 22 September 2008

Statement

Dr. Andreas Kaufmann
Chairman of the Board
Leica Camera AG

(The spoken word)

Distinguished guests, friends of Leica,
I would firstly like to apologize for this very personal commitment to Leica sincere thanks! Dear Wim Wenders, accurate if you had the experience Leica is not in word and image can take. And I am delighted that the value of the good image - and that's Leica like no other brand - particularly in fast-paced digital age so high. As you also want us to secure the future of remembrance. The theme of this year's Photokina, which starts tomorrow, could not be better fit. We want this future for you tonight to begin - in isolation from the bustle and fair with friends. Among these friends I count here incidentally also explicitly Renate Gruber, the wife of the Photokina-founder Prof. Dr. Fritz Gruber. Dear Ms. Gruber, I warmly welcome you!
Wim Wenders and I have something in common: the love of the Leica camera, this enthusiasm for a brand with more than just brand. It is myth. My family and I have the potential for spontaneous enthusiasm. Than we do with the ACM in 2004 Leica entrances, all of us was clear: This is not just any corporate involvement. Certainly none that promises quick returns. No, this is an investment in the future! We have not hesitated when the opportunity offered to the majority of Leica Camera AG to take over. Because we think long term. Leica again, and because the viewers have to guess what it is at the core: one of the best brands in the world.
Today I stand after difficult days at the helm of the Board. I tell you why: Leica for me is passion and mission at the same time. Together with my colleagues on the Executive Board and the staff I want to lead this company there, but also its products are: to the top. Never again should Leica, this strength in innovation and know- how so large enterprises, a lack of power or strategic mistakes suffer! That is the ACM, my family. That is myself And last but not least is that the management of Leica Camera AG.
It has in the past few months showed that Leica also in times of crisis on the first-class know-how and high motivation of the workforce can fall back. Therefore, let me also at this point something to tell the staff: Thanks to your enthusiasm, your experience and your ambition is again up with Leica. My colleagues on the Executive Board, Mr Lobejäger and Mr. Trippe, have worked with me in the past few months, the turnout at success. We have worked with professional help and, together with colleagues from our manufacturing and management structures improved. We have become slimmer. Innovative. We are better and faster now. In the past two years, we have several rounds of reorganization successfully carried out abuses in the company halted and Leica consistently placed on a consolidation course. The rehabilitation is progressing further good progress. The new era at Leica, she has begun!
A dry spell is still ahead of us. But we have a long breath. Because we know that Leica will soon flourish on their own will. Our strategies must also consider the time, to pay off. That is why we are thinking about quarterly reports and squint also not on short-term balance sheets. We invest long term and on a broad front in new products. The starting tomorrow photokina is for us an important snapshot. We still have more surprises in the quiver. The fireworks will begin precisely what we will begin tonight show is somehow the initial spark. But for a moment, I want you to the torture still tense.
It sounded in Wim Wenders' film with our already M8: Leica is the way further into the digital future - and boldly at the highest level, as you will see. But without compromise on the fundamental values of our brand. In its eventful history this company has always made sure that their products in quality, precision and practicality remain unattainable. Because Leica - that is, with all technological progress is still selection, craftsmanship and precision. We must not at any price first, with security but the best.
Nearly 100 years history of photography at Leica means generations of scientists and engineers who were never satisfied with the results, which were only passable. It had the best results. The development work of these pioneers and inventors, the accumulated know-how of an entire century, the ambitions of our employees - all for only a push of a button, a moment captured in the perfect picture.
The first successful camera ever, the Ur-Leica, is now the most expensive camera in the world. Often copied, it is the mother of all miniature cameras. Oskar Barnack invented it in the Ernst Leitz factories Wetzlarer shortly before the outbreak of the First World War. This invention revolutionized photography, journalism, and indeed our world. Some with Leica cameras shot images were even legend. That, I must always think if I Che Guevara printed on the T-shirts look. The picture has shot Alberto Korda 1960. With a Leica. It went around the world.
Such Leica images were icons for entire generations. They dominated the life feeling of their time. Leica became one of the leading German brands, the epitome of German engineering and the ambassador of "Made in Germany". Leica cameras, advanced to coveted collectors' items and status symbols. Well-known photographers such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Capa photographed with a Leica. Even photo-artists of today are doing it - like Alex Webb, Anton Corbijn, Jim Rocket and Rene Burri.
Politicians, actors, artists, models, I could enumerate about the Queen, Brad Pitt, Dennis Hopper, Eric Clapton, Seal, Bryan Adams, Giselle cuffs. You see: From its attraction and its Nimbus has the Leica until today none.
This historic grown and the value of our products founding myth has its roots in Wetzlar. This city is like no other in Germany with the fotooptischen industry. It is a commitment to Wetzlar, but also to our own origins, if we in about two years to the cradle of the Ur-Leica return. 2010, production, logistics, research, development and management after Wetzlar move into our new corporate building in the park Leitz. There is currently heavily built. The progress every day, you can jump on the field watching. Again, we set a clear signal for the start. Leitz of the park goes to the initiative of our ACM and will be back along with other holdings fotooptischen Leica also offer a permanent home. The future of memory itself - that was also a matter of the heart!
We are happy to visit. Already, every day we lead our guests through manufacturing. In Leitz Wetzlar Park should therefore also a Leica Camera Museum arise. In the Leica Gallery, we are planning exhibitions of well-known Leica photographers and photo enthusiasts, we have at our academy Leica for many years successfully and continue their education. The fascinating history and product World of Leica, Leica experiences, all feel that come to us.
This myth that surrounds our brand, is missing many of our competitors. Of course, I know how to market conditions. Also in Asia are good cameras built. And from our friends in Japan, we have learned a lot. Sometimes we even cooperate with them. But mass class can not replace. And new technologies need to mature. I would like to take this opportunity with a clear bias: Leica digital trend has no sleepy. But pixel technology initially did not go far enough to meet our high quality standards to meet. We always followed the motto: no compromise on the optimal picture result.
With the S1, we have then to twelve years, a high-performance digital camera scanner developed regarding the resolution, dynamic range, depth and quickness to none. Unfortunately lacked the capacity and the necessary money to development. We have gradually moved. We have sought partners. While the other "digital revolution" and exclaimed, with more or less sophisticated products entered the market stumbled, we went the way of the "digital evolution" to the rapidly evolving technology carefully to our demands and overall brand values. These were our clients guilty. Yet only Think of all the world high- precision estimated Leica lenses, for which our engineers have received much praise. All handmade. The could not simply against any chip margins. We wanted the motif not only by pooling our high- performance lenses, but also in the light of sharpness and brilliance lossless hold.
The volatile world in the digital age will ever easier impressions and memories mouse can be deleted, the more important it is the precious moments in all their beauty and depth to preserve. We want nothing less than the future of remembrance will receive. That has Leica since the invention of the Ur-Leica made strong. For that we have in the past months completely new set. Therefore, we have many years of development work developed a product that is today arguably the best- kept secret even Leica is. Internally, we have the project named "Africa" camouflaged. That has nothing to do with the black continent, but rather comes from the abbreviation and auto-mirror reflection. A F R.
And with our "Africa" we present today the first result of the new era at Leica before: our flagship, an auto-reflex camera, as none of Leica expected. A camera for the professional sector, as technology-makers and future products in other segments will show the way. That is why this camera is our lighthouse, a sense of abstrahlt Leica on the whole product range.
Remembrance and Future at Leica go hand in hand. Please say with me, therefore, the oldest and the youngest Leica product accepted, the Ur- Leica of 1914 and the smallest digital high-end professional camera in the world: "Africa" aka LEICA S2.
That is the LEICA S2. From the ground up at Leica developed. In Germany, designed and built. Smaller and lighter than any comparable medium format cameras of the competitors. We therefore speak of an entirely new format: the Leica Proformat. Thanks to modern processor technology is the S2 also twice as fast. The Leica Maestro image processor is a world first in the digital market. Highest image quality. Ultra Quicker access. Minimal energy consumption. And come to our new S-Leica lenses, the luminous professional lenses on the market, with high-precision autofocus, the Leica itself has developed an extremely fast and central locking for very short shutter speeds. Again, this unique S lenses, you can inspect here today.
On technical details I will not miss here. In the course of the evening it is clear that much opportunity. Our product managers are happy to speak and answer questions. Only so much still to be our goals: As a "state of the art" attacks in the S2 Pro digital segment. For us, this is uncharted territory. A new target audience, from the very beginning we take very seriously. That is why we have been in the development of the S2 the needs, desires and experiences of professional photographers with the process. Leica wants and will be here permanently in the front row establish. We have a lot of time and money invested to build efficient distribution channels and a professional service offering. We have today a strategic alliance with Phase One agreed. We want to work closely with the technical development and marketing of our professional products work together.
Leica and Phase One fit because of its culture, its extraordinary innovation and highest quality of their outstanding claims with one another. We complement us very well, especially in the sales area. Together with Phase One will be for the professionals we will soon launch new products and services.
Distinguished guests, Leica is an exciting future of the opposite memory. The S2 is the departure signal, while only the digital tip of the iceberg. Do you expect from us in the coming months, further good news and excellent high-end products in all segments. I also wish for all customers of the R-series that we have with high enthusiasm and a lot of work on a R10. They nailed me on a date not fixed. But the R10 comes.
Dr. Andreas Kaufmann decided the speech with a quote from Sebastiao Salgado: "Leica, these are friends." 

(Thomas)

Source (retrieved on 24.09.2008 - 23:26): 
http://www.photoscala.de/Artikel/Leica-das-sind-Freunde



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